


A Decade In The Sun

by Literate_Wolverine



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: (though it's brief), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arranged Marriage, Breeding Kink, Comeplay, Discussion of fisting, Exclusively from Jaskier's shitty dad, Felching, Homophobic Language, Inhuman Witcher Physiology, M/M, Nobody actually says 'Daddy' but the vibe is somewhat there, Older Man/Younger Man, Rimming, Strangers to Lovers, courting gifts, discussion of knotting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-06
Updated: 2020-07-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:27:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25111621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Literate_Wolverine/pseuds/Literate_Wolverine
Summary: “You’d like us to be intimate then?”  Geralt inquired earnestly.  Jaskier nearly choked on his spit.“We’remarried, aren’t we?”“Plenty of married couples would rather clean gutters than see each other bare.  And you have that tavern girl of yours, from the village-- hush, that’s not an admonishment.  I just assumed you’d been… put up for auction, when a groom was requested in the place of a bride.  That you had no earnest, physical interest in men.  Or if you did, that I was out of your age bracket.  Which is acceptable.  I have less than no interest in traumatizing you, or anyone, with my attentions.”It was beginning to sink in for Jaskier that maybe,  justmaybe, he had in fact been joined in holy matrimony with a perfectly lovely man.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 205
Kudos: 2361
Collections: Geraskier Midsummer Mini Bang, The Witcher Alternate Universes, wiedźmin





	A Decade In The Sun

**Author's Note:**

> IT’S DONE! A MASSIVE thank you to my two artists, [Ssleif](https://ssleif.tumblr.com/) for the photocollage moodboard and [Linx1457](https://linx1457.tumblr.com/) for the cover art/porn, as well as my beta, who knocked this out Rapidly despite me getting it to them… rather late, [Polished-Jade](https://polished-jade.tumblr.com/) (who’s just polishedjade here on AO3!)
> 
> I didn’t tag for infidelity, because it occurs at the beginning of an arranged marriage and before Jaskier and Geralt get to have any meaningful sort of conversation (and it doesn't damage or impede their relationship,) but I’m mentioning it here in case it’s a point of contention.
> 
> There's also mentioned, though quickly dissipated, fear of domestic violence.
> 
> Also known as: Jaskier is Nineteen and Responds to All Stress and Conflict by Trying to Fuck: the fic.

Jaskier really thought he’d get to live his own life for a moment there.

The existence of his (older, married, landed) sisters, in combination with his father’s obvious disdain for his pursuits _had_ , until now, led him to believe he’d be free as a bird in adulthood. The Viscount de Lettenhove would much rather have his sister Magda’s husband, and subsequently one of their children, inherit the title, which suited Jaskier just fine. His first year at Oxenfurt had been a revelation, a vision of what life was to become once out from under the thumb of his nobility, and he’d returned home for the summer with a song in his heart.

The Viscount and Viscountess hadn’t even deigned to break the news themselves. He tucked himself away in his room the first night home, so relieved his parents were off in court with the king that he never stopped to wonder _why_ that might be. It wasn’t festival season, and they’d had no conspicuous national strife.

William, his family’s primary retainer, handed him a thick envelope with his meal tray at dinnertime and left without another word.

Inside, on the King’s own stationary, was a letter detailing the agreement by which the School of the Wolf would find sanctuary in Kerack for no more than ten years, to escape the spreading civil uprising in Kaedwen, and in exchange for boarding and asylum would exterminate monsters at a flat reduced rate when called upon by king or court (though independent contracts with peasantry could still be carried out at traditionally negotiated fees.)

Jaskier had no idea why he specifically was being informed of this, but his sense of romance and adventure were intensely engaged.

Until he got to the third page.

_‘In order to foster positive relations and achieve certainty regarding the goodwill of the Witcher(s) towards the Gracious and Merciful Royal Family of Kerack, and their continual goodwill after this tenure is up, a marriage contract will be drawn up between a Wolf of his school’s choosing and a spouse of Noble breeding. Upon consideration that a husband has been requested in place of a wife, the court has chosen Julian Alfred Pankratz de Lettenhove to be wedded to Geralt of Rivia.’_

He read the paragraph over and over, until the words had no meaning anymore, and then read it again.

There was no doubt in Jaskier’s mind that his father had offered him up like a sacrificial lamb when the Witchers sent their stipulation.

They’d had an explosive row over Jaskier’s decision to major in Liberal Arts this time last summer. Jaskier argued that it was his passion, that the arts were what wrote history, the history that _mattered_ and was _remembered_ \-- that it was an appropriately noble calling, essentially.

His father retorted that he’d hoped Julian, for once in his miserable life, would’ve taken an interest in something that did a single ounce of good for ‘ _this family_ ,’ instead of pissing away money on yet another worthless pursuit.

It was the last conversation they’d had. The Viscount had retreated to their lake house for the two weeks leading up to Jaskier’s formal departure for school, leaving him blissfully alone with his stern but somewhat caring mother while he readied to ride off with a small guard accompaniment for Redania.

And now this.

Appetite gone, he began tugging on his boots to leave.

A husband. A _man_. That’s where it started, Jaskier thought-- thirteen years old, scatterbrained and loud but very bright, something of an annoyance to his parents, but still a male heir with potential. He’d go climbing into the stable rafters with the farrier’s boy after his lessons, his parents for the most part content to let him burn off his boundless energy outside rather than pester them. He and Alex would catch toads and swim in the little pond behind the livery and kiss chastely, mouths closed, playing at adulthood without any real understanding or intent.

His governess found them like that one day, pouring over a few of the illustrated books Jaskier had snatched from the library, leaning shoulder to shoulder and pecking dry lips together, laughing.

Alex’s father had been released from his retention at the manor before dusk, and had all his worldly belongings packed onto a wagon by morning.

Jaskier was never disciplined. Neither of his parents actually spoke to him about it. They didn’t have to. The cold, stiff isolation was its own lesson: he had outed himself as something shameful, something other. Something so unacceptable it could not be talked about.

His mother had softened when he began chasing merrily after girls at fifteen, something in her seeming to un-tense, but the thread between him and his father had fully snapped that night.

Jaskier left via the servants quarters, not quite sneaking, but trying to stay reasonably low-profile.

It was a full twenty minute walk into Lettenhove village proper, but the dusk gave way to a bright moon, and the early summer night was warm enough that he was comfortable.

The Cock and Gander Inn was audible from half a mile down the road, seasonal logging work leaving them full to bursting in the warmer seasons. The bright firelight glowing out from the open door and two large, street-facing windows were a balm on his heart. All of Lettenhove was familiar to him, but this little corner of town was both familiar and _good_ , which couldn’t be said about the rest of it. He slipped unobtrusively in, intentionally taking up much less space than he usually did. Blue eyes scanned the drunk, friendly clientele for a familiar head of curly hair.

He found Lyssa by the bar, trying to load too-many too-full drinks onto a stained wooden serving tray. Jaskier waited until she left to make her rounds and slipped into the space she’d occupied. It was a vindication almost strong enough to wash away his grief when she finally spotted him on her way back, shoulders dropping, face lighting up, before launching herself at him. He caught her under her arms and swung her around as best he could in the body-packed room, her skirts rippling around her ankles.

“Jaskier! You’re back! You--”

She pulled away from him to cup his cheeks in her hands. Her expression had grown solemn, longing, and he forced himself to maintain eye contact through his creeping guilt.

Still in love with him, apparently.

“Have they told you yet? About the witchers? About…” She trailed off, clearly feeling like it would be indelicate to come out and say. Gods above, did everybody know already? Everyone but him?

He pulled her closer, into a hug, so he didn’t have to look at the heartbreak on her face. “Yeah. That’s… my parents will be back tomorrow, and my--” Fiancé? Husband? Ball and chain? “--my witcher will arrive the day after that. I wanted to come down here and live a little, you know. Before I’m hitched and carted off.”

She pulled away from his chest to look him in his face again, to his chagrin. He tried to smooth the guilt out of his expression, look nothing but earnest. He really did like her, cherish her friendship, her quick wit, he just--

“Rob!” Lyssa called, waving down the barman. “Can you roust Nia from upstairs to take over my shift?” The barkeep’s eyes flicked back and forth between them, forehead creasing kindly.

“Sure thing. You take the rest of the night off.”

She turned eagerly back to Jaskier, and he swept her up in his arms, carrying her towards the stairs. They’d been fooling around for a few years now, making time for each other whenever Jaskier could escape his obligations at the estate. He liked having somewhere to go, someone who wanted him, a distraction from the impending reality of his high-born duties. She liked having a paramour, a wealthy beau to sweep her off her feet, take her away from her meat-and-potatoes life.

And then Jaskier had gone away to Oxenfurt, laughed and drank and fucked his way through freshman year, and Lyssa had stayed in sleepy Lettenhove, pining.

“What’s Redania like? Does it really freeze over the whole winter? Have you made many friends?” He hip-checked the door to her little corner room open, making her laugh when he dropped her onto the thick-stuffed straw mattress.

This was a bad idea. Unkind of him, on several levels, even if his intentions weren’t malicious.

“Scorching in the summer and frigid in the winter, though beautiful. We’re housed in the same building as the philosophy students, who are prats. The theater and literature majors are by and large wonderful, with a few notable exceptions, and I’ve… I’ve made a few good connections, I think.”

Samantha with her very muscular legs, for one, and Nell, who’s bosom could distract a disciple of Lebioda. He shouldn’t be doing this. He sat down on the bed next to her.

Lyssa beamed at him. “That’s wonderful! I mean… you’ll be able to go back, won’t you?”

He’d been very deliberately trying to avoid thinking about that. His family would have no more obligation to put him through university once he was pawned off in holy matrimony.

He didn’t have high hopes for his witcher’s investment in Jaskier’s higher learning. Even lower expectations regarding the man’s ability and subsequent willingness to _pay_ for it. Seeing the despondence on his face, Lyssa leaned in to kiss him, licking softly into his mouth.

Jaskier went with it, kissed back, and soon they were undressing, both flush with pleasure, although Jaskier avoided her eyes.

He put his mouth on her until she nearly drowned out the din from the tavern below, stopping her when she tried to guide him into herself. No sense making her pay for contraceptive potions come morning, or worse, forget to do so and land her with a babe the father didn’t want.

No child should ever have to experience that.

They got him off with hands and thighs rather than penetration. His necking and sweet little encouragements fell short of the grandiose praise Jaskier usually showered on his bedfellows, but if Lyssa noticed, she didn’t say anything. She let him fall asleep curled into her plain little bed, hiding unrepentantly from what his life had in store for him.

\---

Jaskier slept until late morning-- Lyssa was up and bustling shortly after dawn, leaving him to fall back asleep in her bed with a kiss on the temple that made him want to wither in guilt.

Rob handed him the crusty end of one of yesterday’s loaves on his way out the door, the men from the livery and the metalworks down the road wolf-whistling and hooting as he hoofed his way back to the manor. Neither the footman nor any of the other servants mentioned his disheveled return. The fact that it might have been out of pity killed the remainder of his good mood.

His parents would return on the morrow, and he wanted to have the things that were actually important to him packed away by then. He could move the stuff he hadn’t taken with him to Oxenfurt into the old fort the King was putting the wolves up at. Jaskier didn’t know what would happen when the ten years were up, and they moved back East to Kaer Morhen, but for now he was going to operate as though he’d never have the opportunity nor finances to replace his finery again, and take it all with him accordingly.

It gave him entirely too much time to think in his opinion.

There was the wedding two days from now, with an attendance list more prestigious than any event his family had ever hosted. A drove of carpenters, servants, and decorators were making a din in the sprawling back gardens, pruning the trees and tending flowers, setting up the seating, the staging, the altar.

He shoved his binders of sheet music entirely too roughly into one of the sturdy wooden crates provided for him. He and the witcher-- Geralt of Rivia-- would be sharing his accommodations until they left after the wedding, so he couldn’t pack his bedding yet. By the end of the night all other evidence of Jaskier’s personality had been neatly removed from the room. How depressingly appropriate, he thought, exhausted and anxious and… just the slightest bit curious.

He ate ravenously when food was brought up this time, grateful nobody was trying to make him stand on ceremony in the dining room. William had given him two surprisingly strong bottles of mead with his food, and Jaskier pounded them quickly enough to make his stomach churn.

Perhaps not the most well-adjusted coping mechanism, but university had solidified in his mind that it was certainly the fastest and the easiest. Full and tipsy, he climbed onto his plush bed, the middle of his empty room, and took out the letter to read again.

‘ _A husband has been requested in place of a wife._ ’ He didn’t know what to expect from a Witcher, notoriously monstrous in ways no one could ever adequately explain to him, but he imagined what he could: broad and tan and strong from a life of travelling and fighting, proud and archetypically _masculine_ , in a way neither he nor the other boys he went to school with with were. He’d call himself handsome, certainly, even strapping, but young men of twenty summers with stubble nowhere but their chin were altogether different from the loggers in town, or the vulgar-mouthed men at the docks.

Jaskier thought about his witcher, coarse and strong and vulgar, and pressed a hand between his legs. The man likely didn’t want the marriage either, was the sacrificial envoy of a guild trapped between a rock and a hard place, but perhaps he would still want him. ‘ _A man,_ ’ he imagined the original correspondence had specified, before being rewritten in obnoxious official language, ‘ _I’ll marry a man_.’ There weren’t men in brothels outside of major cities: too much prejudice, too dangerous. He wondered how long his witcher had gone without a partner of his preference.

Jaskier still thought about men sometimes, hand wrapped around his cock. More than sometimes, actually, though the trauma of that first experience had put him off pursuing them. Women were wonderful, but the thought of someone strong and hirsute, with hard flat planes instead of soft curves, had an incredible appeal.

Was that the witcher’s thought process? If Kerack was going to trap him into this arrangement, he may as well get a warm body out of it? Jaskier hummed, anxious but… titillated. Would he be ravenous for him, when he arrived? Jaskier was aware he was supposed to be the carrot at the end of a sick-- a carrot so good the guild would abandon their sacred neutrality, or at least his husband would, even after their tenure in Kerack was up. He’d already been informed in the letter that his family wouldn’t stand on the ceremony of keeping them apart until their vows. The witcher was to be thrown into his room, for him to keep happy and… _busy_.

Jaskier shivered, removing his grinding palm. The thought suddenly wasn’t so enticing after all.

He fell asleep cold, tipsy, and very much alone.

\---

His parents’ arrival home was just as unfortunate as Jaskier had feared it would be. They rode up in the late afternoon, a retinue of palace guards in tow. Presumably to determine the safety of the venue, since much of the Court of Kerack and beyond had been invited to witness the union of the happy couple.

He sat on the front steps and waited, determined to make this as uncomfortable for them as he possibly could.

It simultaneously felt like a victory and a slap across the face, watching his father’s expression drop and then draw closed upon seeing him. Jaskier did him the favor of waiting for him to dismiss the guards, directing them around the side wall to the gardens where the wedding would take place, before addressing him.

“No letter? No ‘ _Hello Julian, hope this correspondence finds you well, the King and I have mutually agreed to have you hogtied, slathered with sheep’s blood and thrown to the-- borderline literal-- wolves-_ ’” His father raised his hand and then waved it. For a second Jaskier thought he was being dismissed -- that the Viscount De Lettenhove not only didn’t care for his happiness, but wouldn't even listen to his grief -- until the man hissed under his breath.

“I won’t have you making this _scene_ in public.”

Of course that was what concerned him. “Let’s take it indoors then, father-mine.”

He turned to look at his mother. He didn’t have high hopes, but there was at least a _chance_ -

She met his gaze for a few seconds, and then gathered her shawl and went inside, wordless. He followed her into the foyer, watching her retreating back as she made her way into the main hall, before turning back to the Viscount.

“I know how badly you wanted that diplomatic appointment in Metinna you were up for when I left for school. Is this your consolation prize? The only thing that can get you off in your old age, playing God--”

“I won’t stand here and suffer you talking to me about what ‘ _gets me off_.’ I made as suitable a match as anyone could make for you, I think.”

Jaskier was short-of-breath, heart-racingly furious that the words upset him. How many years of disregard-- worse than disregard-- and still some part of him was invested enough in the man to be moved by his cruelty. He’d spent the last nine months flourishing, out from under his family’s shadow, making himself into a man who he thought would be able to go back to Lettenhove and feel nothing, knowing that he was riding down a path that would lead away from here forever. And now even the certainty of that eventual escape had been torn out from under him.

“I’m _nineteen_. If you wanted to betrothe me, you would’ve needed to do it while I was still legally under your jurisdiction.”

“The King made a special dispensation allowing me to act in your stead.”

Jaskier hated that he was the first one to escalate to yelling. “You were _not entitled_ \--”

“I was fully entitled! If a noble son is to play bridegroom to one of those things, it seems sensible that it should be one who might at least enjoy it.”

Jaskier’s entire body went cold and then hot: choking, seething rage and humiliation stealing his tongue and turning his face red.

“I was _thirteen_! They were no more indecent than kisses on the cheek, and _you_ \--”

“They were _sodomy_ , Julian! It’s not behavior that can be learned or unlearned, it is the condition of a degenerate, of whores and elves and _witchers_. By some divine stroke of provenance I was able to find something to do with you that honors this family, and you will see this through, or you’ll have nothing left in this world! I won’t put you up, here or at Oxenfurt or _anywhere_ , should this fall through! You’ve made nothing of yourself so far, and subsequently have nothing to turn to outside of this household. You show up at the altar tomorrow or you never show your face here again, do you understand?”

He held tightly to his anger, lest it give ground to grief. “........tomorrow?”

That was… there was supposed to be time. Not much of it, granted, but enough for Jaskier to… he didn’t know. Didn’t want to admit that perhaps there was no action, in this situation, nothing that an extra day or week or month could do to improve his condition.

“He sent a letter ahead from Temeria. He’ll be the only one here in time for the wedding, his fellows following directly to Fort Declan within the month. The man should arrive tonight, at which point he will be shown to your room-” And Jaskier had known that, but hearing his father say it, so coldly, like he was some sort of... “-so he can freshen up and then be escorted back to the main hall for introductions.”

Jaskier stood there, somewhat at a loss. There was nothing for him to do, really-- outside of physically attacking his father here and now, which, while it would be borderline euphoric in the moment, would only ultimately worsen his already piss-poor conditions. Unfortunately.

The Viscount seemed to take Jaskier’s silence as subservience, because of course he did, turning pensively away from his son with what this time was a true and unmistakable dismissal. When he spoke again, it sounded like the thought of the witcher was almost as distasteful as the thought of his son. “Be back down here by nine, dressed finely. We’ll want you to make a good impression on it, after all.”

\---

The witcher was a half hour late. ‘Late’ being relative, because in the man’s defense, he had specified that any conflict encountered would prolong the trip.

According to the deeply alarmed footman who brought the news of his arrival (and subsequent shepherding up to the bath waiting in Jaskier’s room,) the man had been streaked with blood when he rode up. The heads of six drowners-- bane of the washerwomen who usually worked at the riverbend by the estate, the infestation having put them out of work for several weeks-- were hanging from one side of his saddle, the massive upper jaw of something dragonesque hanging salted and dried from the other.

The man looked pale and anxious from the impression, but conceded that it was good that the monster-slayer was already earning his keep, as per their agreement. It’s all so much a caricature of what Jaskier thought it would be, the witcher riding up in the dark of the night and dripping with gore, that he almost wished he’d been at the door to see it himself.

Then again, his nerves were frayed enough as it was. He and his father had met downstairs a punctual half-hour ago, his mother wanting little to do with this whole business (and Jaskier really can’t overstate how _happy_ he is, for _her_ , that she has the luxury of avoiding this,) and not said a word since.

Lyssa’s cousin was one of the washerwomen who had been forced to use the muddy creek instead. She’d be very pleased, he thought. Look at that, his wonderful husband was already integrating himself into Jaskier’s life.

The witcher, when he arrived, was startlingly quiet. He wore a plain, loose black shirt with grey woolen trousers, and it wasn’t until he cleared his throat that every head in the room snapped to face him.

His husband-to-be, Jaskier decided, was as strikingly handsome as he was… frankly terrifying. Stark white hair was pulled back away from a broad, angular face, with enough stubble to be visible from across the room darkening his jaw. The firelight shone back off of his pupils, like an animal in the night, two iridescent yellow coins surrounded by a slightly darker iris. Beside him, Jaskier’s father took a sharp, audible breath, and they both watched the way those shining pupils tracked _immediately_ to the Viscount de Lettenhove at the noise, narrowing near-instantly into bright slits.

He stepped forward into the light, pupils flashing back to black but remaining tall and narrow in the torch-bright hall. Jaskier’s stomach twisted, fear and trepidation and the faintest undercurrent of excitement knotting his insides. He waited a beat, for the doorman to announce them to their guest, and then for his father to speak, until it became clear everyone in the room was too startled and white-knuckled to talk to the Witcher. The Viscount, too, seemed frozen, all the callous disregard for Jaskier’s feelings and eager pragmatism at the thought of marrying him off dead in his throat.

After what felt like an eternity, Jaskier himself took a shuffling step forward, eyes tracking nervously from the Witcher’s face down to the broad line of his shoulders.

“Made it here none the worse for wear, then?”

Deeply informal, and he knew he’d be getting a dressing down for it from his father, but he was desperate for a read on the man.

The witcher huffed, posture relaxing, and approached him. It took every bit of Jaskier’s gumption not to back away.

“You’re Julian?”

The voice was _deep_. He hadn’t looked at the Viscount once since Julian began talking, bright eyes raking up and down his body in a way that felt more like earnest appraisal than sexual scrutiny, though it was nearly as unsettling.

Melitile, his arms were huge. His arms, and the breadth across his barrel chest, and his very muscular thighs. Jaskier swallowed thickly.

“The very same. Do you intend to make me into a Witcher? Is that why a man was requested?”

His father had finally snapped out of his startlement enough to react to his blatant, mouthy disrespect, face beginning to purple as he blustered to cover up his son’s faux-pas. “I-- I’m sorry, Master Witcher, what Julian _intends_ \--”

The witcher talked loudly, unrepentantly over the Viscount. His eyes still hadn’t strayed from Jaskier once. It was very unsettling. Unsettling and… somewhat delightful.

Oh, Jaskier did love to be _wanted_.

“No. I specified a man because I like men. Neither myself nor my school are going to do anything to violate your bodily autonomy.” His tone was heavy, loaded, and Jaskier was surprised at how earnest he sounded-- clearly aware of the secondary implications of that promise as well.

Without pausing to let Jaskier respond, he pulled a thick canvas bag from his shoulder, tugging the drawstring open to grab… _something_ out of it.

It was clearly a garment of some kind: a dense, heavy, unidentifiable leather. With a brisk shake he unfolded it, revealing what was clearly a hooded cloak and proffering it for Jaskier. Hesitantly, Jaskier took it.

Gods above, it was heavy-- the thing must’ve weighed at least twenty pounds. Jaskier almost dropped it, not at all expecting the heft. Its inside was lined with a soft, expensive looking black velvet to match the dark slate exterior, with no stitching or embroidery visible anywhere.

It was… dreadfully plain. He rubbed his thumb against the buttery leather, sucking a breath through his teeth and trying to decide the best angle from which to lie about how much he loved it. Was this to be his future? Plain, dark road clothing, a life of dearth and practicality-

“It’s slyzard hide. Fully insulating, fireproof, and- while you’d still bruise from the impact- won’t puncture from any blade not forged with silver.”

Slyzard hide. Jaskier had seen the skeleton of one once, wheeled around with a travelling show. Easily the size of two of his canopy beds combined. They were too dangerous to be caged and displayed, like some ill-advisedly did with basilisks and young wyverns: fire-breathing, venomous, and goddamn near impossible to kill.

The Queen of Kerack had spent last season showing off her forktail-leather bolero at every derby and day-event, gleefully detailing the full, decorated hunting party it had taken to bring it down, and the tanner from Skellige they sent the salted skin to, just to turn it into a workable material.

Forktails, typically, were roughly half the size of slyzards.

Jaskier moved from holding it gingerly in front of him to pulling it close to his chest, folding it neatly over one forearm and marveling.

He did so love nice things. Particularly things nobody else had.

His… fiancé, he supposed, looked pleased with Jaskier’s sudden esteem. The man nodded at him, the corners of his mouth quirking up--

\--and without a word or glance at his father, began walking back down the hall, towards the main door outside rather than Jaskier’s quarters.

“Wait! Your-- you never actually introduced yourself, you realize? Was that to be your next gift?” Jaskier knew his name from the letter, of course, but what kind of guest _did that_ : walked in, bold as you please, handed you a gift ostensibly worth more than every horse in the estate’s stables combined, and then _left_. Actually _left_ left, apparently, since he very clearly wasn’t heading for the personal wing.

Jaskier could feel his father seething next to him, but he didn’t care; he was still deeply intimidated, but it had occurred to him that there was a distinct possibility this whole business didn’t have to be… life-ruiningly bad.

Now out of the central torchlight, Jaskier couldn’t properly make out the witcher’s expression, but the slight narrowing of his shining pupils made him think the man just might be smiling.

“Geralt; suppose you’ll need it for the vows. I’m staying in town tonight; I’ll be back in time for the wedding.”

The door closed behind him before Jaskier’s father could get another word in edgewise.

\---

The wedding was to take place at three, which meant Jaskier was poked and prodded awake at about eight in the morning to start ‘getting ready.’ He was more than a little offended by some of the carryings-on; whoever planned this ceremony (his parents, what was he thinking, of course it was his parents) had decided that a regular procession with two men in the role of husband was impossible, and had thus delegated the role of ‘bride’ to _him_. Not explicitly, and not in as many words, but Jaskier had never heard of another man being bathed, powdered, and perfumed by attendants, to then have flowers tucked into his hair. Which he _especially_ hated, on account of how much he _wanted_ to love it; he could see himself in another life doing it for his own pleasure, on a wedding day of his own choosing.

His mother came in when it was time to get him dressed in layers, shooing the servants and handmaidens out. He gamely held his arms out for her to slide his doublet on, and waited for her to make the first move while she laced it up.

“He doesn’t seem to be a bad man, all things considered. Outside of being a witcher.”

Jaskier’s mouth pulled into a sneer. “Not that it would’ve stopped you from foisting me off on him anyway. I think the Viscount is rather _thrilled_ by the possibility he might hurt me.”

She visibly flinched, but didn’t argue. “We need a reasonable expectation that they’ll keep their word and honor the treaty until its conclusion, and we desperately need their services--”

“We’re not talking about the logic behind the treaty. We’re talking about the fact that I’m your child, and whatever _does_ end up happening, the intent of this endeavour is to curry the witchers’ favor with a warm body to plow. And whisper propaganda in his ear, ideally. Just curious, what about this situation makes you and father and His Highness the King think I’m going to be spending my time crooning this woodland shithole’s praises during our pillow talk?”

She rested one delicate hand on his shoulder, squeezing briefly, and finished getting him dressed without a response.

\---

The gardens, being the wedding venue, were spectacular when he was finally ushered down to them. He recalled his sisters’ weddings, and noted that this was more extravagant by half than all of them. Jaskier wasn’t surprised by his father’s willingness to spend more money on his son’s misery than his daughters’ happiness, but he was disappointed.

It wasn’t so bad at first, flitting around making nice with the guests and pilfering as many champagne flutes as he could. After a few hours, however, it began to grate. He was hyper-aware of the way everyone’s eyes raked down his body in frank appraisal, not out of any interest of their own, but rather curious what the witcher would do with him.

He’d suffered more introductions today than ever before in his life, and every single one of them looked at him like he was a trussed up rabbit.

It was a blessing that he didn’t have to see his fiancé until they met at the altar. The meat-market sensation of this whole experience had turned last night’s cautious optimism into dread so deep he nearly lost his footing on his way down the aisle.

Geralt’s face was unsettlingly neutral as he read his vows, hands seeming so big in Jaskier’s that it made him want to bolt. He was a mountain of a man, even in the subdued formal trousers and waistcoat he clearly found distasteful. ‘ _Sword or no sword_ ,’ Jaskier remembered hearing as a child, ‘ _a witcher brings gore_.’

Geralt squeezed very gently at Jaskier’s hands a couple of times, first when his breathing began to get erratic, and again when his voice cracked during his recitation, but the bard couldn’t interpret his expression well enough to know whether it was accidental or not. He nearly made himself sick as the priest droned on, conjuring lust and violence in the witcher’s eyes where there genuinely seemed to be none, gaze drawn to the sharpness of Geralt’s canines and premolars as he spoke.

Jaskier couldn’t stop himself from flinching when it was announced that they could both now respectively kiss the groom. It made a shadow pass over Geralt’s face, something complicated and so human it startled Jaskier half out of his fright. Then the man leaned in to press their lips together, dry and brief, already pulling away by the time Jaskier registered it.

He was in somewhat of a daze as they walked away from the altar. They weren’t holding to the convention of a couple’s first dance, his parents assuming Geralt was too ignorant to know how, so the social dancing and afterparty were rolled up into one event. Every single manor door was open for the guests to wander in and out at their leisure, and the music and chatter created a dull roar in Jaskier’s ears.

By seven o’clock the sun was more than half down, casting everything in spectacular pink and gold light, and if Jaskier didn’t get out of there right that instant he was going to have a fucking breakdown.

He turned to Geralt the minute their cloud of sycophantic well-wishers finally dissipated, searching for the words to suggest they both go, _now_ , without also implying it was the marriage bed they were going to. He’d sneak off alone, but he was pretty sure fleeing the room without his husband might be seen as actual treason in this scenario. Geralt, thankfully, beat him to the punch.

“You want to leave now.” It wasn’t a question, which Jaskier appreciated, and with a mutual nod Geralt began carving a path through the crowd with a delightful level of rudeness, Jaskier following in his wake. Nobody stopped them, or said _anything_ , which put his teeth on edge again: thrown like so much meat to a man they thought was going to sexually brutalize him.

A thought which immediately became his primary concern as they walked together up the stairs and through the halls to Jaskier’s room. Geralt paused about fifty feet from his door, finally turning to look at him.

 _Was_ Geralt going to brutalize him? He’d put so much stock in the witcher’s single assurance of his bodily autonomy; but now they were alone, and nobody would come running to the sound of sex from his bedroom, no matter how loud it got. That was rather the point. Geralt looked more frightening than ever, cast in stark shadow by the torchlight. It would mildly inconvenience the man at most for him to grab Jaskier, no matter how much he thrashed, and carry him to bed. Strip him bare and have whatever part of him he wanted.

Jaskier realized he was hard. At attention, twitching, beginning-to-drool hard. What the fuck?

He refused to deal with this right now.

“I’m.... going out.” Jaskier didn’t make it a question, and wasn’t going to cave to the inevitable, invasive, proprietary questioning that was sure to--

“Moon’s not bright tonight. Bring a lantern.”

His mouth opened and closed, soundless, like a fish. Geralt exhaled loudly and nodded his head a few times towards Jaskier’s room, as though shooing him away, leaning back against the corridor wall and crossing his arms. “I’ll head in after you’ve changed and grabbed your things.”

Jaskier scurried off immediately, stripping himself of wedding regalia so fast he certainly damaged some of it and changing into clean, plain clothes and sturdy boots. Hesitating for a second, he pulled on the massively heavy slyzard cloak too. It was entirely too insulating for this time of year, but the knowledge of what it could defend from outweighed his inevitable sweatiness. He hoped Lyssa would agree.

He turned left out his doorway, away from his new husband, and didn’t glance back until he heard the ‘click’ of Geralt closing the door behind him.

\---

The lantern was a boon. Geralt had been right that it was too dark to traverse by natural light alone, even down a path Jaskier had walked a thousand times before. He narrowly avoided eating shit in several potholes he’d failed to make note of last time.

Was it terrible of him, to don the cloak his husband gave him and carry the lantern he’d recommended, on his way to see a girl he wasn’t in love with for sex and emotional catharsis? Maybe. He wasn’t thrilled with that answer, and he hadn’t _knowingly_ set out to become this man, but, well. At least it made him interesting.

Lyssa was already off shift by the time he made it to the Cock and Gander, the party still in full swing despite the late hour. A party, Jaskier realized, for his own wedding, spilled out from the manor and into the world, into the whole rest of his life. Some of the villagers had clearly pooled to buy a cask of ale for the occasion, and everyone not working was well enough into their cups by the time he arrived that Jaskier wasn’t worried about being spotted.

Lyssa nearly jumped out of her skin when he made himself known, turning from where she was refilling oil lamps to look at him like she’d seen a ghost.

Jaskier hadn’t realized he didn’t have the faintest idea what to say until his mouth opened and nothing came out. She stood and straightened, watching him flounder, face rapidly cycling through several emotions that were gone before he could settle on one.

She looked angry, but not at him, and there were tears in her eyes. “This is goodbye I suppose?”

‘ _This is me running away from my problems_ ,’ he thought, because he’d already said goodbye to her in his heart-- the part of his heart she was after, at least-- nearly a full year ago when he’d headed to Oxenfurt to move on with his life. He felt like it would be even scummier to say that than just think it, though.

And, shamefully, he would still like to get laid if that was on the table, so he simply replied, “It is.”

They kissed almost chastely on their way up the stairs, leaning into one another and escalating to slow, easy making out the minute they were through her door. “You look good all done up in flowers.” She said.

He’d forgotten to take them out of his hair. “Thanks, Lyss.”

He put his mouth between her legs again, and stayed there until her breath was hitching and she pulled him up. She nodded at a small, empty bottle with a distinctive shape on her nightstand when he balked, and he was ashamed of how pleased he felt by the thought that she had wanted him to come to her, had planned for it.

Gods, he needed to examine his self worth issues.

Jaskier pushed in slowly and fucked her like a metronome, like he knew she liked, hard but not brutal, and flawlessly rhythmic.

She hitched herself on top of him to ride him as they both neared their end. There was a moment where he closed his eyes and all he could focus on was the weight of her on top of him. He liked that-- not being in control of the sex, letting things simply be done to him, because he was _wanted_ , and for a split second he imagined larger, rougher hands pinning his shoulders, that he might open his eyes and see yellow ones boring down at him as his husband took his pleasure--

Jaskier came with a shout, reaching down urgently to rub two fingers against her clit in time with the last few thrusts he could manage. Her whole body shuddered and then relaxed in her release, flush face peaceful as she dismounted and crumpled onto the bed beside him.

She was a wonderful woman. It was definitely for the best that Jaskier’s marriage made this a clean cut. He was too cowardly, he thought, to sever things correctly with her if left to his own devices. He would’ve come home from school and carried on with her every summer until he graduated, preventing her from looking elsewhere or moving on, and then unceremoniously cut contact. He had many fine qualities, but the bravery to disappoint people, even if his avoidance created a greater wound, wasn’t one of them.

Lyssa laid her head on his chest, and he shuffled his whole body to bracket her, determined to give her the loving last impression she deserved, a sense of well-earned worth to carry with her into her future relationships.

Geralt seemed a brave man. Maybe some of it would rub off on him, eventually.

\---

They didn’t kiss goodbye when Jaskier put on his clothes and cloak to leave in the morning. He felt good about that-- as good as he felt about any of this. Lyssa had the heavy, pensive look of someone who’d lost someone, and was facing the massive ordeal of getting over it, but who had every intention of doing so.

He was so caught up in the drama of his own life-- in the drama of convincing himself not to immortalize this ephemeral, unequal relationship in a ballad, actually, because he’d fucked with with Lyssa’s life enough already even if the composition would be _fantastic_ \-- that he didn’t notice his cloak until it made a child shriek with glee. He looked up to see her chubby little finger pointing at him, tugging at her mother’s skirt to get the woman’s attention.

Jaskier knew kids could be rude, but he doubted a child that young had successfully identified his walk of shame, and he was dressed perfectly respectably--

\--and his cloak was glimmering like oil slick. It startled him when he looked down at himself, freezing up and then swaying deliberately from side to side to watch the colors move. It didn’t sparkle or refract obnoxiously, but the dark sepia leather glistened in a rainbow everywhere the sunlight caught it, rippling like water with the motion of his body.

Jaskier loved it. He wasn’t sure he could’ve conceived of a more beautiful, _narratively dramatic_ garment if he tried: dull as dishwater in imperfect torchlight, brilliant out in the sun.

Why hadn’t Geralt mentioned this? The promise of a kaleidoscope experience outdoors would’ve appreciatively warmed him to the thing, even more than the safe, unbeatable utility.

It wasn’t very often one encountered something sturdy, practical, and _beautiful_ too.

He stopped drawing attention to himself in the middle of the street and continued briskly on his way, somewhat embarrassed. Just as well he wasn’t told; there was no way he could’ve imagined the way it looked, unobtrusive but mesmerizing, from a verbal description. And his husband didn’t seem the type to care about those kinds of things, besides. Not that Geralt seemed to hate them, just that that man had so far preferred to let all the things he did and said speak on behalf of their own merits, rather than forcing those merits down others’ throats.

Jaskier suddenly had the sinking feeling he’d made a mistake.

‘ _A groom has been requested in place of a bride_ ,’ the letter said. “ _I specified a man because I like men,_ ” Geralt said.

“ _Neither myself nor my school are going to do anything to violate your bodily autonomy._ ”

It was possible, Jaskier decided, that he hadn’t given Geralt an entirely fair shake. There was no time like the present to rectify that.

\---

He crept carefully around the west side of the manor, opposite from where droves of servants were now breaking their backs to clean up and undo all of the seating and provisions they’d put together days before. He knew, from years of sneaking in and out, that he could go through the kitchen’s side door and take peripheral hallways up to his room with very little chance of seeing anyone of social import.

Likely everyone was deliberately avoiding his wing of the house, actually, on account of the sounds they suspected would be coming from his bedroom. Pigs. He considered it a high mark in Geralt’s favor that the only person who seemingly _hadn’t_ expected yesterday to end with Jaskier split open on cock was the cock-haver in question.

He spent about thirty seconds outside his own doorway wondering what he should open with, what he even wanted to _convey_ , before remembering that his husband could almost certainly hear him making an indecisive ass off himself out here. He shook himself briefly like a dog, figuring he did most of his best thinking on his feet anyway, and let himself in.

Geralt was leaning over Jaskier’s previously emptied-off desk, its entire surface now covered in alchemical equipment-- beakers over fire, dried plants galore, and some sort of evaporation chamber he must have asked brought up from the old court wizard’s things. The man was considerate enough to feign surprise at seeing him, glancing at him once-over for injuries before going back to his task with a perfectly cordial “Good morning.”

Well. Ball in Jaskier’s court, then.

“I’ve come to the realization that it was exceptionally rude of me not to return home for the night. It has similarly occurred to me that I might apologize for my behavior.”

Geralt snorted loudly, eyes flicking up with clear amusement before re-applying himself to grinding his pestle into... whatever plant that green pulp used to be. “You might, but you don’t have to. You’re allowed to have fun, Julian. The fact that I’m not personally prone to boisterousness doesn’t mean I have a fundamental objection.” He sounded a little bit tired, and a little bit… if Jaskier didn’t know better, _teasing_.

“How’d you know I’ve been having fun? I might’ve been perfectly miserable, wandering the grounds till dawn in my despondency.” He sloughed off his (wonderful, perfect) cloak and draped it carefully over the back of an armchair.

A louder huff from Geralt, and it took the man looking up again, now fully attentive with a real, eye-crinkling smile on his face for Jaskier to realize it was a _laugh_. “Your hands and mouth smell like cunt, pup.”

Jaskier’s blood turned to ice in his veins.

In higher social circles, hiding a spouse's indiscretion from peers was infinitely more important than punishing it: creating seething, unwelcome homes, but no real push-back. How different was it for witchers, he wondered? Would Geralt hit him? Jaskier knew he wasn’t small by anyone’s definition-- six feet flat as of two summers ago and reasonably broad across his shoulders, though thin and rangy in his youth, but he wouldn’t have a prayer against Geralt. Not in a real fight.

Would… would he annul the marriage? He _could_ , Jaskier realized with dread, as they hadn’t consummated it. Julian Alfred Pankratz would be stripped of rank and banished from his home for the shame. Banished from the _country_ more than likely, too far from Redania to get back to Oxenfurt on his own and unable to pay the rest of his way through school even if--

He nearly jumped out of his skin when two huge, warm hands bracketed his shoulders. Geralt was in front of him suddenly, a line creased between his brows. “Breathe slowly. With me.”

He was having a panic attack, he realized. Geralt’s breaths were almost _too_ slow, out of a normal human cadence, but Jaskier followed them for a few minutes and settled.

When he finally spoke again, Geralt’s voice seemed too warm and mellow for his rugged face. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to threaten you. I don’t mind you messing around, Julian; I know you didn’t ask for this. And you’re _nineteen_.” It sounded like the last bit pained him.

Relief crashed over Jaskier like waves breaking on a beach.

“Jaskier.”

“What?”

He shook the hands off his shoulders, self-conscious, but didn’t back away. “Only my family calls me Julian, and I’m sure you’ve noticed we’re… not the closest-knit bunch. I greatly prefer Jaskier.”

He waited for the jab about renaming one’s self after a flower, reading clear amusement in the quirk of Geralt’s mouth, but nothing came except an agreeable hum. “Jaskier, then.” Geralt turned from him, settling back in his uncomfortable wooden chair to continue fussing with his herbs and sundries.

It couldn’t possibly be that simple. When Geralt didn’t say anything more, effectively ignoring his presence in the room, Jaskier pulled a chair up next to him and sat down.

“You really don’t mind my having sex with other people?”

“Exclusivity is a conversation we haven’t had. And don’t have to, if that’s not something you’ll ever want.” He set his tools down again, crossing his arms over his chest. “I’d like for both of us to end up happy with this arrangement. If that means we go against the rules of conventional marriage, so be it.”

Jaskier took a minute to really look at him. He’d gotten the general impression, of course, broad attractive features and unusual coloring, but at this distance every little distinction was visible.

Well. It’d been visible yesterday too, during their vows, but he’d been somewhat understandably preoccupied at the moment.

Geralt had the beginnings of crow’s feet and laughter lines, still shallow and unobtrusive, and three places on his jaw and one at his hairline were nicked with short, pale scars. A single larger scar bisected his left eye, though the eye itself didn’t seem to have damage. His eyelashes were long but pin-straight, as white as his hair.

He looked like a man who had lived a _life_. It filled Jaskier with the same giddy, impatient feeling arriving at Oxenfurt had; he wanted to go _do something_ , go _be someone_ on his own merits, out in the broader world. He wanted to know things because he’d experienced them, not needing to take anybody at their word.

And who knew more about the world at large than a witcher?

“Thank you for the cloak, by the way.”

Geralt’s mouth twitched, like he was trying to look less pleased than he was. “It’ll keep you safer on the road. There was another gift, for the wedding night, but you were otherwise occupied. Would you like it now?”

Despite feeling initially unrepentant about his dalliance, Jaskier withered a bit in guilt. Geralt didn’t sound judgemental, but.... Jaskier had someone to run to, when that whole circus was said and done. Geralt had been alone, in someone else’s room, in someone else’s house, in someone else’s _country_ , just as much a victim of circumstance as Jaskier.

Except Jaskier had gotten to get off, and Geralt hadn’t.

He pursed his lips together, hoping his husband could sense his lack of ill-will, because heavens take him if he knew how to convey it verbally. “Yes, please.”

The older man stood and walked to the left nightstand, where it looked like he’d brought up the entirety of his saddlebags, and began unlacing one of the smaller pouches.

“Didn’t trust the stableboys enough to leave your baggage with your horse?”

“I trusted them with my _horse_ , which is high enough esteem. There was a middle-aged man and a younger one, when I rode in night before last--”

“Mikkel and Tom. They’re good people, you know.”

“I don’t doubt it. But very young men are none too clever, and Tom looked a little too starstruck by the Slyzard head hanging from the saddle. I keep several potions premade and on hand for emergencies, and decided it’d be prudent to keep them with me. Less temptation.”

“I’m taking that ‘very young man’ comment personally I hope you know. So what, you were afraid of the grubby peasantry getting their hands on your secret and illustrious witcher concoctions?”

Geralt pulled a dark, simple wooden box out of the bottom of the satchel, and made his way back to Jaskier. “And killing himself with them, yes. Of the four potions I keep on hand only one isn’t swiftly lethal to humans. And that one would still give him the shits like spoiled pork.”

Jaskier took the box when it was offered to him, and gulped. “You’re… really quite far removed from humans, aren’t you? I mean, they tell all sorts of stories, and most of them seem to be horseshit, but you lot really are quite…”

“Monstrous?”

Jaskier frowned. He’d been worried about that, at first, but here he was two days later, two exceptionally fine items richer (though he hadn’t looked at the second one yet) and utterly unmolested in body and mind. “Different. A wolf’s not a dog, but that doesn’t make it an unholy abomination.”

The moment felt intimate, suddenly, and Jaskier made quick work of opening the box to try and diffuse it.

Inside, nestled on top of a folded scrap of linen, was a very fine comb. It was made of some pale, shining ivory material, scrimshawed intricately with simplified running wolves and floral motifs.

Jaskier nearly dropped it when, upon picking it up, three little forget-me-nots budded as though out of nowhere and burst into bloom along the spine of it. He watched in awe as they appeared and, over the course of the next fifteen seconds, closed and subsequently shrank back out of existence, only for six bright white daisies to take their place.

“I… is it enchanted?” Jaskier didn’t know why his husband would’ve paid for such a specific yet functionally useless enchantment, but he _loved_ it, more than he could say, watching with absolute glee as pink strawberry blossoms overtook the daisies.

“It’s carved from Leshen antler. If you pluck and plant the flowers they’ll grow hale and healthy for the remainder of the plant’s natural life, even in the wrong conditions and without tending.”

Leshen antler. And this was just the world his husband lived in, wasn’t it? A magical creature acting as a bulwark for humanity against other magical creatures, tanning Draconid hides and carving Relict parts into the tools of his trade.

And of his courting, apparently.

Jaskier beamed at him, setting the comb down and standing so they were on more equal footing. “You know, abandoning higher education might not be so bad if you’ll teach me how to do this. Probably make a substantial piece more than what you do monster-slaying, actually.”

Geralt froze, the easy affection wiped off his face by something worried. “You’re dropping out of school?”

Jaskier... didn’t know what to say to that.

“Well, I can’t expect my parents to pay for it now that I’m no longer a part of their household, can I? And my tuition is…”

Two days ago he would’ve had no qualms telling Geralt he made a piss-poor pittance compared to the generational wealth Jaskier was accustomed to having accessible, but it now seemed somewhat indelicate, in the face of the man’s earnest overtures.

“You do realize how much money your parents-- and your country-- gave the Wolf School as your dowry, right?”

“Enough for you to rebuild Kaer Morhen once it’s safe to go back to, I believe was the thought process.”

Geralt frowned. "It's _your dowry_. Meant to cover your cost of living, which includes your schooling, so it doesn't come directly out of my pocket. You’re talking like they paid me some kind of stud fee."

Jaskier stood silent for a long minute, dumbstruck. “You intend to use… I’m really going back?”

Geralt returned his incredulous look in full. “You have no weapons training, no physical conditioning, and no experience hunting or foraging. You can’t start a _fire_. I’m not taking you on the path with me.”

It was an exceptionally strange feeling, Jaskier decided, to be filled in equal parts with bone-deep relief and offended indignation. “I’m-- nobody ever _taught_ me those things, how am I supposed to conjure a brand new skill set out of mid-air? Was I supposed to intuitively grab a sword and go charging into dark caves the minute our betrothal was set in stone?”

“So you want to go on the path with me?”

“Certainly not! I just… I’m not a child or an invalid, Geralt. I would like a _choice_.”

If he was being honest, prior to this conversation it’d never occurred to him he might be expected to travel with his husband, and if it had he’d have forestalled the wedding and avoided the man twice as hard; but something about being told he _couldn’t_ come along lit a fire under his ass.

Jaskier worked himself up with it, compiling his case in his head-- if these were things the witchers had expected in a spouse they should’ve said so, and since they didn’t, Jaskier can’t be expected to suffer hearing about it as though it’s a personal shortcoming-- when he heard that little huffing again from Geralt, that _laughter_ he could now identify.

“What’s so funny, then?” Jaskier bit out, pink in the face.

Geralt’s smile, much as the bard hated to admit it, was dazzling. “You’re a spoiled little thing, aren’t you? Want it both ways or not at all.”

A spoiled little thing. It was somehow as deeply condescending as it was… distressingly arousing. Jaskier went just a little bit pinker, and determinedly ignored it.

“I’m your husband. I expect you to be attentive to my needs and desires, independent of your feelings regarding my _qualifications_.” He bit out, thinking that would be the last of it, that Geralt would take him at his word and never meaningfully address the underlying causes. Like his parents, and every other married couple Jaskier had ever encountered, did; like you were supposed to do.

Instead Geralt turned towards him, Jaskier’s bravado dying down in the face of the man’s absolute, undivided attention. Those canny yellow eyes just looked at him for a bit, long enough to make him start to sweat, start to _squirm_ , although he had no intention of backing down.

Then the witcher crossed the three strides between them with slow, telegraphed steps, and gently grabbed one of Jaskier’s hands in his own.

“Very well. How can I attend to your needs and desires, husband?”

Oh. _Oh_.

That hot, eager flush was back with a vengeance. “I want… rather, I _don’t_ want to be dumped at Oxenfurt and _forgotten_. I have my schooling and you have your path, and neither of us chose this, but news of my marriage will doubtlessly have reached Redania by the time Autumn semester begins. Which means, even though you’ve said you have no objections, I can’t carry on dallying with my classmates and the city’s fine hard-working streetwalkers. Not without being branded a harlot and a homewrecker. Which wouldn’t be the end of the world, except that I frankly doubt anybody will be _willing_ to lie with me under the impression they’re helping cuckold a witcher.”

Geralt had gone from smiling to pensive. “I… that hadn’t occurred to me. I apologize.”

There it was again. Jaskier could count on one hand the number of times either of his parents had apologized to the other. They mostly just ignored it for a few weeks and then made grand, expensive gestures-- apologies meant accepting blame. And this was his second from Geralt.

In the hollow place where his righteous anger had been mere minutes ago, Jaskier began to feel slightly, achingly _tender_ towards the man in front of him.

Tender enough to test the waters, as it were. “Thank you. I don’t mean to imply it’s something you’ve orchestrated on purpose, just that it is my situation, as it stands. And as you’ve pointed out, I’m a nineteen year old boy. Man. And _as such_ , would be very distressed if three of my four years at university were spent celebate.”

Geralt snorted, and Jaskier lifted his free hand to swat at the man’s hip. The witcher bore it with good grace.

More tenderness, in the pit of his stomach and the center of his chest. He could grow very used to this, he thought.

“So, while I’m aware that I cannot expect you to stick around campus and lavish me with your attentions year-round, I would like to see you at least four times a year, for a week or more. I know that means you’ll have to stick to contract work in Redania and Temeria for the next three years, but it’s. Well. Important to me.”

Geralt squeezed his hand and nodded. “That’s doable. Will I be staying with you in your rooms, or finding my own lodging? Cities are… expensive, north of the pontar; not impossibly, but it will influence when I’m able to come.” Tourist season and the holidays would _definitely_ be out-- you could nearly buy a horse for what it took to week-rent a room at Oxenfurt in full swing of the spring festivals.

“Of course. Once I bring a copy of our marriage certificate to the records office the academy will have no grounds on which to deny your right to share my lodging--”

“That’s not what I asked. Are _you_ comfortable with it? Inviting me over on your terms is different than having me freely share your space for indeterminate periods of time.”

Jaskier twisted their joined hands so their fingers laced together. “I... think I would like it if you stayed with me, yes. All the better to _attend_ to me, as I’ve mentioned.” Geralt had begun rubbing one of his big, calloused thumbs up and down the back of Jaskier’s hand in an incredibly distracting fashion.

“You’d like us to be intimate then?” Geralt inquired earnestly. Jaskier nearly choked on his spit.

“We’re _married_ , aren’t we?”

“Plenty of married couples would rather clean gutters than see each other bare. And you have that tavern girl of yours, from the village-- hush, that’s not an admonishment. I just assumed you’d been… put up for auction, when a groom was requested in the place of a bride. That you had no earnest, physical interest in men. Or if you did, that I was out of your age bracket. Which is acceptable. I have less than no interest in traumatizing you, or anyone, with my attentions.”

It was beginning to sink in for Jaskier that maybe, just _maybe_ , he had in fact been joined in holy matrimony with a perfectly lovely man.

“That’s… quite the relief. Not just the, ah, desire not to do me harm, which is commendable, don’t get me wrong, we are very much of an accord on that one."

"Mmm. What else, then?"

"Just that I’ve always heard witchers are _considerably_ lusty, you see, and when you made no move nor comment on our shared accommodations I began to wonder--”

His unfortunate rambling was interrupted by a soft, dry kiss, pressed unmoving against his mouth for three long seconds before being punctuated by a small, electrifying lick across the seal of his lips. Jaskier parted them eagerly, high-strung libido roaring to life at the meager provocation, but Geralt had already pulled back to continue their conversation.

“I didn’t mean to make you feel unwanted.” Their faces were closer now, and all Jaskier’s traitorous body could focus on was the heat of Geralt’s breath against him. He debated how bold he was willing to be. His late return home meant lunch was already over, and he sincerely doubted anyone would come calling them for dinner if they didn’t show up.

Jaskier reached up to wrap his arms around Geralt’s shoulders. “You can make it up to me.”

\---

They didn’t make it as far as Jaskier expected to in their first round. He knew he was good in bed, that he was lean and symmetrical and desirable, but his ability to put on a show was swiftly and completely undermined by Geralt undressing, all muscle and scar tissue and man, and grabbing both their cocks in one fist to jerk them hard and fast to climax.

“You’re a man who gets right to the point.” Jaskier said, panting. He didn’t know if he was disappointed or relieved; new habits in the bedroom could be taught, with time, but an old one he didn’t like would be a nightmare to work through. It was probably for the best that Geralt--

“You’re nineteen, and I haven’t fucked in two months; that was to take the edge off. You’re not leaving this bed-- unless you explicitly ask to-- for the next four hours at least.” Jaskier had his back to Geralt’s chest, in a position that one might call spooning if they were so inclined. Jaskier was not, on account of the fact that it would make _him_ the little spoon.

He felt Geralt’s mouth curve into a toothy smile against his neck. “Sorry to interrupt the free verse poem you were composing in your head about our anticlimactic sex life.”

The man really _had_ gotten a good read on him somehow, hadn’t he?

“Free verse is passé until you’re over fifty and have enough life experience that rambling without structure can ostensibly be made interesting. It was a tavern diddy, if you must know, on account of you not giving me _nearly_ enough material for a ballad.”

Geralt pinched his side not-so-gently, and licked into his mouth when Jaskier turned to admonish him for it. It made sense for a man nearly a century old to be an incredible kisser, but the implications of all that experience being focused on _him_ , in this and other arenas, were blowing Jaskier’s mind. He broke them apart about two minutes in, before his dick could start leaking again. They’d already established his husband had the nose of a bloodhound, and being taken to task for having a wet prick within an hour of his last orgasm and _five minutes_ of insulting Geralt’s ability to satisfy him in bed wasn’t something he was looking to be humbled by.

“Not that I’m not glad we’ve had our little talk about things, really, get off on the right foot as adults and equals and all that, but this was rather what I expected on our wedding night-- I thought you might find where I’d run off to, drag me back to the marriage bed.” Which had been a perfectly dreadful thought at the time, but now, devoid of the fear that had colored his every interaction with his husband, it seemed _incredibly_ \--

The thought cut off as Geralt pressed his face into the hollow of his neck and… _smelled_ him, like a snuffling hound, the quick in and out of his breath tickling against him. “What on earth are you-”

“You like the thought of that. Now, at least.”

Jaskier coughed, and turned a little bit redder. He wished fervently that he could sink into the bed and disappear forever when Geralt’s eyes went wide with understanding, nostrils flaring and lip curling up.

“Jaskier,” he crooned, low and rumbling and indulgent, “Did you want me to do terrible things to you?” He didn't seem at all put off by the concept, surprisingly, which bolstered Jaskier's confidence anew.

“I was somewhat _conflicted_ on the matter if you must know. As that is no longer the case, please do go on with your guesswork.”

Geralt's stubble was scratchy and wonderful as he drew his cheek across Jaskier’s shoulder and neck, huge hands cupping proprietarily under the poet’s meager pecs and gripping. “Did you want your new husband to flip you over and bruise your guts, like they put you in here for? Like all your highborn friends think I’ve been doing for days?”

Oh. The man _talked_ in the bedroom. That was… hm. He’d have to follow that thread more intensely when he wasn’t hard enough to cut glass, ogling Geralt’s chest as the witcher moved to perch on top of him.

“Is that why you were shaking when we parted ways in the hallway? Shivering like a waif in winter, cockhead getting all wet--” Jaskier made a surprised little noise, and Geralt laughed. “I could smell it, pup. You thought I was finally going to drag you off and have my way with you? Bend you out of shape the night of the wedding, give you a whore’s gait on your way out the door?”

“They really weren’t kidding about the lustiness, were they, sweet Melitile-”

“It’s one of the only things people consistently get right.”

Jaskier was mortally offended for about twelve seconds when, upon saying that, Geralt got up and _walked away_ ; right up until he heard the sound of a cork being unstoppered and the bed creaking under his husband’s weight again.

Geralt placed his knees on either side of Jaskier’s hips, reaching down to pull his cheeks apart with one hand while the other rubbed oil-slippery over his hole. It felt alarmingly vulnerable and very, _very_ good, both sensations only heightened when the tip of Geralt’s middle finger began thrusting shallowly in and out of him. He slowly worked up to fucking the whole thing into him, then two, then three, all at such a leisurely pace it made Jaskier melt into the bed beneath him.

“Can I expect this level of care and dedication in all our encounters?”

Geralt hunkered down and nipped him lightly on the shoulder for his lip. “I’d rather be safe than sorry this time of year-- which is the other thing I’ve been meaning to mention. I’ll be going into my rut in a few weeks, and it’s probably best for us not to travel together until then. It would give you a bit more time to get your life in order at the very least.”

“Crook your fingers again-- oh, _Gods_ , just like that. I, ah, think I might develop a hernia if I spend any more time ‘getting my life in order’ here.”

“Then one of my brothers can help move you out, and I’ll meet you at Fort Declan when it passes. I’ll be insatiable and… _proprietary_ , if you stay with me.”

A soft kiss was placed against his nape. It would’ve been innocuous, except that there were three huge fingers fucking in and out of his ass like they had all the time in the world, simultaneously making him feel too-full and desperately empty.

Geralt continued his train of thought, ignoring Jaskier’s turmoil. “I don’t want to disrespect you, but it tends to drag on three or four days-- it’s better for me to burn it off in a brothel.” He felt Geralt’s lips curl into a smile against his skin the same moment his fingers crooked meanly into Jaskier’s prostate. “You could play with that girl who’s so enamored of you a few more times for the road.”

Which, no, for Lyssa’s sake he should stay well away from her, but something about his huge, hairy husband talking about him fucking someone else, with the same fond inulgence he might use while discussing Jaskier frolicking at the beach or reading cheesy one-copper romance novels, took his cock from lazy half-hardness to full and throbbing again. Like it was _cute_ of him, chasing after skirts, how _sweet_. Sincere and confident and utterly unthreatened.

It was so distracting that it took Geralt’s unoccupied hand stilling his gently rocking hips to remember what they were supposed to be talking about. Huh. A _rut_. Like an animal in season. Jaskier shivered, not entirely sure he wanted to pass this opportunity off to a lady of the night. Or several. Four days was a prodigious period of sexual exertion by anyone’s estimation, but with a witcher’s libido...

“I’m... disinclined to send you off to a whore when I’m present, eager and willing. Elaborate?”

Geralt began smoothing one huge, hot hand up and down his flank, shuffling forward to press his-- Melitile, it may as well be a horse cock-- prick against Jaskier’s ass. Jaskier liked that too, he realized: himself hard and dripping and so _little_ compared to Geralt, though not in the grand scheme of things, prick entirely ignored by his lover in favor of stuffing his hole.

“Do you want the long form or the short?” Geralt asked.

“The long, _please_ , I’ll have you know how I feel about a good _long_ \--” The witcher goosed him to shut him up, snorting against his back. If he didn’t put his cock in Jaskier soon the bard swore to Lebioda he’d file for an annulment.

“The baseline set of mutagens are extracted from monster genetics. The most prevalent is that of the werewolf--”

“Is that why you’re the wolf witchers, then?”

“No, actually; a variation of the werewolf decoction is the first administered in all schools. It’s what enhances our healing and stamina, gives us a fighting chance to survive the rest of the mutations. It augments our immune and endocrine systems, but also our… instincts, I suppose. They can’t be separated from the healing factor, so we end up with both. And the knot, at least when we’re in season.”

“And the _knot_ \-- hold on. You’re telling me one of these ‘instincts’ is the desire to, occasionally, just… fuck relentlessly? And then plug it all up in there?” He deliberately chose the least flattering phrasing possible, which would hopefully obscure how goddamn _hot_ the thought got him.

“The desire to _breed_. It only lasts until it burns out because we’re all sterile.”

Jaskier was struck by the thought: himself, pregnant, too heavy with child to do anything but lie there and take it. Geralt would come home, strip himself of armor, and head upstairs to where Jaskier was sleeping. Would tuck his pants and braies down under his balls, climb on top of Jaskier, and fuck him awake. Manhandle his swollen, clumsy body into place and get off inside of him.

It was an impossible concept from both ends, but Jaskier was startled by how arousing he found it. What exactly had he been missing, eschewing male company all these years? What else didn’t he know about himself?

"Do you remember what you said earlier? About my dowry being… that is to say, my _acting_ like it was some sort of--" Jaskier's face had gone red, and he swallowed thickly, "--ah, stud fee?"

Geralt shifted to one side, peering intently down at Jaskier's face. "Yes."

"Could we maybe play that game?"

Geralt’s eyebrows shot up, but his cock twitched conspicuously against Jaskier. “Now or in my rut?”

“Either. Both? I’ve begun to realize what a tremendous oversight avoiding men’s beds has been, and cannot overstate how eager I am to correct that. Moreover, if you don’t pull your fingers out of my ass and start fucking me like you mean it there will be _severe_ consequences.”

Geralt did obediently pull his fingers out, shuffling backwards and looking at Jaskier like he hung the moon. “Up on your forearms and knees then.”

“Don’t want me missionary? Consummate our union as traditionally dictated by Gods and Country?” Jaskier didn’t even pretend to hide his eagerness, scrambling into position immediately despite his shit-talking.

The hot press of Geralt’s body climbing on top of him, his scratchy chest pressing into Jaskier’s back and his flush cock hanging below Jaskier’s own between his legs, was incredible. “To the best of my knowledge God-fearing nobles don’t ‘traditionally’ ask to be mounted and bred.”

He was so eager he could barely breathe at the first press of Geralt’s cockhead against his slack, empty hole. For all his impatience, the overabundance of preparation made the initial breach _divine_ \-- he could definitely feel the stretch, inch after inch forcing his insides wide in a way that made him feel wonderfully debauched, but there was no pain. It felt, he thought-- a bit deliriously-- like he was made for this, to be a beautiful, coveted thing, occasionally hollowed out by witcher cock. He moaned loudly when he felt Geralt’s balls press up against his body, settling his chest down lower to buck back into the intrusion. He could see his own prick bouncing with the movement when he hung his head to look underneath himself, making him gasp and tighten up enough for Geralt to grunt like he’d been punched.

The witcher laughed, petting down his back and rumbling low in his chest. "What a _good boy_ they gave me."

Jaskier panted, red in the face. “You’re going to kill me with that talk.”

Geralt rumbled again, patted his shoulder sympathetically, and set about fucking him so hard the bed slammed against the wall.

Jaskier was, at once, both rapturously happy this marriage had been arranged, and _furious_ that he’d been dissuaded from fucking men prior to this stage of his life. He wondered if this was how he made the women he fucked feel-- Jaskier hoped so. He felt full and well-used, able to feel the fucking in every part of his body, from curled toes to furrowed brow.

Jaskier didn’t realize he was making noise with every breath, a loud, panting ‘oh!’ to announce each time Geralt bottomed out, until the witcher began _talking_ again. “Oh, you _love_ this, don’t you? Maybe you really would like me in my rut-- fuck you so full you’ll smell of it for weeks.”

Gods yes. He wanted to be full, as full as Geralt could make him. “A-and you’ll knot?”

Geralt licked up the side of his neck, hips moving like a wave, slow and deep and utterly relentless. Jaskier could feel the hot drag of the witcher’s cockhead in his belly, deeper than he’d ever known he could feel. He was stuffed and surrounded and _wanted_ , caged in by the careful arms around his waist, like something Geralt couldn’t live without, an indulgence too good to give up.

“And I’ll knot. We’ll have to stretch you open for it, get you wet and loose and limber. Maybe pick up some toys to play with.” Finally, _finally_ , Geralt reached down to very loosely fist Jaskier’s dripping prick, almost more tease than relief. “Or we could try our luck with all five fingers. Would you like that? My whole hand up your ass, forcing you open enough for a knotting? A breeding?” Jaskier moaned loud enough that it could reasonably be called a scream when Geralt thrust into him twice more with bruising force and came for the second time.

He could feel the man’s cock bounce inside of him, balls tightening and throbbing where they pressed against Jaskier’s taint. It was almost enough to get him off on its own-- if Geralt would just tighten his grip just a _little bit_ , the slightest hair more friction--

Geralt did, in fact, tighten his grip. Near-painfully hard, and at the base of his cock, abruptly cutting off Jaskier’s own budding orgasm. Jaskier _thrashed_ , gone from ecstasy to indignation in a heartbeat.

“That was-- I hope you have an _exceptionally_ good explanation for that! Because I value generosity in my bedpartners very highly, and this marriage is in danger if I find you lacking in that department--”

“You can wait, spoiled thing.” He thrust his still-stiff cock lazily into Jaskier a few more times, pushing his cum deeper with wet, obscene noises.

“Wait for what? For your mid-life crisis to finish? For Judgement day, when the trumpets blow and humanity’s sin is washed away in--”

“For me to lick my spend out of you.”

Geralt snarled when Jaskier’s hole tightened like a vice around him, softening cock oversensitive.

“ _Oh_. That’s…” Jaskier sniffed primly, determined to hide how his interest had roared immediately back to life at the suggestion. “...acceptable. I suppose.”

Geralt pulled out of him, giving his ass an encouraging pat when Jaskier didn’t immediately shift back up onto his knees from where he'd collapsed into the bedding. “Glad you’re amenable, my lord.”

“Oh shut it, you-- Melitile’s tits, Geralt!” Whatever else he was going to say was forced out of him in a wheeze as, without any prompting, Geralt sealed his open mouth over Jaskier’s hole and began working his jaw, licking enthusiastically into him. It felt like nothing Jaskier had experienced before, nothing he’d even imagined: wet and intimate and taboo, the very thought illicit in a way that made his eyes roll back into his head as much as the sensation itself.

“Aah! Oh, _fuck_ \-- no warning lick? No damp, suspenseful breathing into my crack, give me a chance to get a feel for it, maybe-- that was absolutely _not_ an invitation to pull your tongue out of my ass! You started this and you’re going to finish it!”

He could feel Geralt smiling against him and couldn’t be bothered to care, as long as he kept going. His tongue couldn’t penetrate very deep but it was _dexterous_ , and feeling Geralt’s cum dripping out around it, down his perineum to slick his balls, brought him back to the edge. “Touch me, I swear to all the Gods--”

Blessedly, Geralt did, reaching between his legs to tug at Jaskier’s cock, dragging his foreskin up and down over his crown in a tight, deliberate grip. Jaskier keened and came so hard that his balls ached, adding to the mess already staining the sheets between his legs. Geralt grunted against his hole, panting harshly for a few moments before drawing back. Jaskier flopped onto his side just in time to watch him milk his cock through the end of his… Gods, _third_ orgasm.

They both shuffled until they were back to belly again on the far left side of the bed, avoiding the wet spot. Geralt wrapped his arms around Jaskier, tucking one huge thigh between Jaskier’s to effectively cage him in. It was nice.

“Since I have you here, how do you feel about being a trophy husband? Because now that I’ve seen you naked I _really_ feel there’s potential for--”

“Go to sleep, Jaskier.”

\---

Geralt didn’t argue when Jaskier informed him they _would_ be leaving together that afternoon. What kind of spouse would he be, he asked, to abandon his other half in his time of _desperate, throbbing need_ , and then proceeded to leer at Geralt’s soft cock until the older man flushed red and started pulling his clothes on.

With a few changes of clothes and essentials thrown into a pack, the rest of his things having been sent ahead days ago, Jaskier followed Geralt out into the manor. All of the servants balked and averted their eyes as they passed, he noted with no small sense of satisfaction. His loud, rigorous review of Geralt’s performance had carried apparently, and if they couldn’t be happy for him, fuck ‘em.

William met them at the door, where their horses were already saddled and tied, to regretfully inform them that the Viscount and Viscountess were unfortunately unable to see them off, but wished them well in their life together. Jaskier hugged him, feeling lighter than he’d been in weeks, and told William he could tell his parents to shove it up their ass.

The wide stretch of forest between the manor and Fort Declan was a beautiful ride in the summer. He and Geralt had another two and a half wonderful months together before he had to return to Redania for his second year, and Jaskier intended to learn everything he possibly could about his husband between here and there. “Have you decided what our scheduling will be, once I’m back off to school?”

“Eager to be rid of me already?”

“Hardly. I wasn’t kidding about you being a trophy husband-- the more time I have to work out the logistics of your very dramatic and impressive introduction into my social circle the better.”

Geralt turned his head pointedly away when he failed to suppress his smile. “I’ll escort you back to Oxenfurt for first term, come to winter with you over the break, return for the week leading up to Belleteyn, and pick you up to escort you back home come summer again. Is that acceptable?"

Jaskier imagined it: riding in through the western gate in his glistening cloak with his warrior husband. The eternal fire fanatics in the theology school were going to soil their robes, but he’ll be the _envy_ of every arts student on campus. ‘The things Jaskier’s husband could _do_ ,’ they’ll titter, ‘the things the man has _seen_ and lived to tell about.’ Which reminded him.

“Geralt, what’s the most bizarre thing you’ve ever seen?”

Geralt finally turned to look at him with exaggerated despair, the warmth in his eyes ruining his credibility. “Is this how the whole trip’s going to be? You wringing me out for creative material?”

“The whole marriage, more like. Don’t you want us to work, darling?”

Geralt laughed, making Jaskier feel like the center of the universe, and started telling him about a surprisingly benevolent monster he’d taken a contract on outside of Mettina. That happened to be made entirely of arms. There was a joke there, somewhere, and Jaskier was going to find it and musically exploit it to its fullest.

**Author's Note:**

> The end art is Linx's alternate cover, because I didn't want it to languish in obscurity and not get posted!
> 
> I cut SO MUCH out of this because I completely misjudged how long it was going to be (and I originally signed up to write a fic under 10,000 words. My bad.)
> 
> I fully intend to write about now-friendly Geralt and Jaskier doing a full, perplexed rundown of the weird-ass wedding gifts the nobility thought a witcher and bard respectively would appreciate, as well as Jaskier both getting more New Nice Monster Things and absolutely flexing on other nobles/his parents with them.
> 
> I also want to write the first time Geralt comes and visits him in Oxenfurt, with the other students largely thinking his marriage to a witcher is a hoax that Jaskier made up for attention until his Huge Fuckoff Husband is waiting outside of class for him one day. 
> 
> …...and them doing a consensual-non-consent scene pretending Geralt did drag him into bed on their wedding night…..
> 
> WELL. If you have any thoughts for any of those ideas/preferences for which I tackle first, please let me know! I hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
